So, Just How Bad Is It in Iraq? as per Christian Science Monitor

LSSpam said

I don't see the connection. The Pan-Arab movement was largely secular and in most of it's manifestations (the Baath in Syria and Iraq, Nasser in Egypt) cracked down hard on fundamentalist/extremist groups viewing them as both backwards and a threat (one of the ironies of the Pan-Arab movement, which began in part to present a united front against Western Powers and Israel specifically, is how focused it was on Westernizing their countries at the same time).

Maybe you mean it "animated the modern terrorist movement" in the sense that it rose in opposition to Pan-Arabism? I think that's a stretch but much less so then the above.

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And Western policies toward Pan-Arabism and secular modernizers like Nasser were inveterately hostile because that generation of post-colonial leaders were working to wrest control of the region away from the West and they were opposed to the establishment of a Jewish state in their midst.

They were seen as a threat to the status quo -- e.g. ownership and control ofassets like the Suez canal -- and we worked in every way we could to undermine them.

The humilation of the secular modernizing Arabs and the fact that we would not deal with them in any way that might have allowed them to deliver some semblance of progress to their populations meant that they were undermined and the Islamists easily filled the void.

Be careful what you wish for.